As with many other playing card decks, not all Hanafuda decks are created equal. Often different grades of decks are designated by their box art or wrappers. The difference in quality may be reflected in the material used to make the cards or in the color and quality of the illustrations.

While most modern Hanafuda decks are printed on card stock, the original Nintendo decks were hand-painted on mulberry bark. Today, Nintendo is still one of the most popular Hanafuda deck manufacturers. They have even produced special edition Hanafuda decks that replace the traditional Japanese illustrations with more modern pop culture references (like their character Mario). Nintendo's best Hanafuda decks are packaged in Napoleon boxes, while their medium quality decks feature Tengu, and their cheaper novelty decks come in a wrapper with a simple nature scene. In Japan, the cheapest off-brand Hanafuda decks are plastic and come in solid-colored wrappers.

In the same way that American card makers sometimes put their stamp on the Ace of Spades, many Hanafuda deck makers put their mark on the Plain Paulownia card. This is an easy way to find out who manufactured a deck that no longer has a box or wrapper.

Most Hanafuda decks generally have a black, brown or red border; a rare few (like a limited edition Disney set) even have green borders. This is because most serious Hanafuda players carry two or three decks to keep the game moving quickly from round to round. Having decks with different colored borders allows them to shuffle one deck while the other is in play without mixing cards up or giving players an opportunity to cheat.

A traditional Hanafuda deck has 48 cards divided into 12 suits – one for each month. Below, we have divided the deck into a complete listing of cards by suit. The point total for each individual card is listed to its right, and the total value of each suit has also been tallied beneath its corresponding cards.

While the easiest strategy for scoring points is to match cards of the same suit, in many Hanafuda games there are special combinations – or dekiyaku – that will earn you a significant point bonus. These combinations vary from one game to the next, but generally they follow a similar theme – like cards with tanzakus, cards with animals, or 20-point cards.

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